Story:Kings of Strife/Part 46
Part Forty-Six Vik awoke with a headache. His ears were ringing, and all around he felt warmth. It was comforting and relaxing – like an embrace. He felt tired and his eyes were heavy, and thanks to the warmth all around him, he felt as if staying where he was, resting in warmth, would be all he needed in life. For just a moment he relished in that relaxation, that gentle touch, and smiled. A voice cried out to him, and his eyes snapped open in alarm. As he sat up, Vik saw that he was surrounded by black fire – rather, he was consumed by it. The flames licked all around him and erupted from his hands, his chest, and his face. He yelped and crushed his eyes closed, forcing all of his energy into his eyes to stop his Tyrant ability. It took him a moment, but soon he had ceased the fire, and the warmth left his body. He sat up, and all around him were ashes. The roof of the massive Inusian complex was a mess. Bluecoat corpses and ashes were scattered all about, and many were still alive or running about. Vik’s ears felt like they were ringing, and as he focused his vision to look around, sound gradually returned to his senses as well. The roof was loud, and between rampant gunshots, screams, or the odd sound of the wind blazing about viciously, he could think of no other word to describe the situation but chaos. Yet around him, in the unholy circle where his flames once blazed, there was a knoll of silence and deathly peace. He heard his name being called once again, and a hand gripped onto his shoulder. Vik turned to see Karilyn Red squatting with a massive object in her right hand and holes on her large green cloak. Her curly hair had gone undone during the battle that Vik did not remember, and she looked at him with concern and an open, panting mouth. “What… What happened?” Vik squinted at Karilyn, confused on why she looked so urgent, so concerned. His mind felt slow, and his head ached. “You’re not burned,” Karilyn said with knitted brows. “Not even your clothes are burned. How? Is this your power?” “What are you talking about?” A shot rang out near the two, and Vik jumped. Remembering where he was and how much danger he was in, despite the fact that the scene was so chaotic that the bluecoats appeared to be shooting at each other, Vik stood and pulled Karilyn up with him. “Where is the Knight? And Silverius?” “She ran off as soon as they started shooting. I tried to go after her, but then you… Watch out!” Karilyn shoved Vik to the side before swinging the large object she held in her hands right in front of him, blocking a stream of bullets that had been aimed right at his chest. Vik stood back and looked in awe as Karilyn wielded what appeared to be an unorthodox fusion of a wide greatsword and a cannon. The guard of the sword’s hilt was especially long, and three triggers jutted out of the handle. What wasn’t covered by dingy bandages on the wide weapon were either blue spots of sharp metal or multi-colored rivers of wiring, all conspiring to the large barrels jutting out from either side of the sword’s flat blade. Once Karilyn had stopped the bullets with her huge blade, easily half of her own height, she shifted her footing and lifted the blade with both hands. Her right hand grabbed onto a handle of pure metal halfway down the blade’s length and her left hand flicked all three of the triggers as she aimed the blade towards a stunned group of three bluecoats aiming right at the two. There was no buildup of power, no gathering of energy; once she flicked all three triggers, Karilyn’s great-cannon fired a massive beam of pure white light, almost like a laser, and it immediately burned right into all three of the bluecoats. With a groan, she pulled her sword off to the side, dragging the beam of light with it, and the moving beam cut through another throng of Inusian soldiers. More screams and cries of astonishment rang out throughout the roof for the three or so seconds that the beam existed. Then, as fast as it appeared, the beam of light from Karilyn’s weapon vanished, and steam started to waft up from the wires on her sword. She dropped the large weapon with a groan and trembling arms, and cursed. “It’s running out of fuel. Damn it! I’ve got half another shot, maybe. Shit!” The woman looked back to Vik, who stood staring at her with wide, confused eyes, and gave him a pleading look. “Do something!” “Do what?” He grabbed Karilyn’s arm and led her towards a nearby throng of debris clumped together as if rising up to touch the turbulent skies. She dragged the great-cannon behind her and the two crouched behind the cover of stone and steel. Vik patted at his pants. “I don’t have the gun on me, and no knife is going to help here.” There were still a large number of Inusians around at the complex, and their gunshots were starting to converge on the rocks that the two were hiding behind. “Shit! Where is Cidolas?” “Why don’t you use that power again?” Karilyn asked, more urgently this time. She looked into Vik’s eyes and frowned. “What happened to your eyes? They’re not gold anymore. Are you alright?” “Huh?” Vik looked down to his hands and remembered the embrace of fire that he awoke in. “I… I don’t know. I feel weak. What did I do? I don’t remember.” “How could you not remember? It was… incredible. You were completely surrounded by that fire, and… and… you jumped right into the soldiers. You must have killed at least thirty of them. The fire was black, and it burned away everything… There was nothing left of them. They couldn’t even shoot at you. It only lasted for a few seconds before you just… stopped.” “I was… surrounded by the fire?” Vik looked at his hands once again, and they trembled. ‘What sort of power do I have? I killed that many people in such a short time…?’ The concept of his fire being so powerful, so righteous and yet so disgustingly sinful in its ability to eradicate, teased at Vik. He could feel his very morality bending… and it horrified him. “I… I don’t think I can do that again. At least, I don’t know if I even want to.” A rack of bullet exploded from the rock, flying right between the two of them and sending them ducking to the ground. All of Vik’s thoughts returned to the priority of survival, and he pulled his knife free from his belt. “You said you’ve got one shot left in that big gun of yours?” “If we’re lucky,” Karilyn muttered with a gulp. She pulled on her large weapon and visibly shook. “I’ve got to make it count.” The wind started to jump in intensity on the roof, blowing her bleeding red hair about her face. “On three, we jump out and run for Silverius. Do you know where he is?” “No idea. Start counting, Scarface.” Vik chuckled. “You got it, Red. One…” The wind seemed to continually magnify, and visible streams of shrapnel and debris swam through the air as if flowing through a raging river. Gunshots burned through the river as loud as ever. “Two…” Before he could get to three, the debris – the bluecoats – and the wind itself exploded, rushing in all directions like the creation of a new universe. Vik and Karilyn were blown backwards, their clothes and robes blowing around them as the sudden storm of wind buffeted into them. The wind kept blowing, and blowing, until it felt as if it could grow no more. Holding his hand in front of his face, Vik squinted into the source of the ridiculously powerful wind. His jaw dropped. Standing right in front of him, in torn grey prison rags and the wind visibly blowing around him like a tornado, Silverius looked straight down at the ground with dead, soulless eyes. “He’s alive!” screamed Vik. He looked over to Karilyn, who squatted next to him, both hands on her sword and her eyes clenched close. Vik had to yell ever louder to be heard over the cacophony of the storm. “Silverius is alive!” “What?!” Karilyn yelled, though more out of inaudibility than surprise. “He’s alive!! He’s right there!” Vik glanced back to Silverius with a smile, only to see the mercenary look up and stare at Vik from beneath his long, disheveled hair. His eyes were glowing a bright, violent golden. The mercenary took a step towards Vik and Karilyn with those same dead eyes. Stormy winds rushed towards the two even stronger, as if it was moving with Silverius at the center. Vik found himself struggling not to be blown away, and minor streams of shrapnel and debris started to rush past him and cut into his skin. Karilyn stabbed her sword through a crack in the ground to hold onto it, and her hair floated behind her as violently as her ill-fitting cloak did. “Silverius! Stop this!!” Vik could not even hear himself screaming over the ruthless onslaught of the storm, beating forward harder and harder with each step the mercenary took towards him. Just as he felt he would be literally blown away and torn apart by the winds – they stopped. While the winds continued to blow and cacophonous sound continued to permeate the air, there was such an instant and drastic change in the situation that for a moment, Vik heard only silence. He opened his eyes to see Silverius standing where he was with the Chosen Knight standing behind him, her arms wrapped around his chest and shoulders. He was looking to the side, right into the Knight’s eyes, and both were golden and bright with Tyranny. Behind the two, very close to the roof of Icarun, hovered a small private-sized airship, and Cidolas Teftah held onto its dangling ladder. Cidolas looked right at Vik, and held his hand out towards him. ***** Silverius was silent as they fled Icarun, and he was not the only one. All of the group stood in silence in the common room of the small airship, as if shocked and struggling to understand what they had just lived through. The Chosen Knight had held onto Silverius’ hand after her gaze calmed him, but he had not spoken and the two had not looked into each other’s eyes since. Cidolas, the group immediately discovered, had left to find an unused airship at the complex and hijack it. Along the way, somehow, he had reunited with the female Cidolas body, and the two of them worked in tandem to control the military ship. Their escape was timely and uncontested; not only was the airship completely painted in Inusian colors, the Tyrant storm that Silverius had manifested succeeded in blowing away almost every still-living bluecoat there. The rescue had been a success, in the end. After boarding the airship, all of the warriors stood in silence. Silverius looked down at the ground, his arms low at his sides and one of his hands limply held in the Chosen Knight’s grasp. She stood right next to him, her body leaning on his and her hands on his chest, but she did not look at him. Now that she was in his presence again, she made an effort to keep her golden Tyrant Eyes blazing, and Silverius’ eyes were bright as well – though it did not seem he was doing it on purpose. Karilyn and Vik stood across from the two; the woman had wrapped up her incredible weapon and stood in a corner of the cramped living room, staring intently at Silverius from beneath her bangs. Vik was quiet and solitary, his arms crossed across his pectoral muscles and his mouth in a thin frown as he looked over the Knight and the prisoner. His eyes were their natural coloration, and his head still ached. “We did well,” the Chosen Knight finally said, “and we succeeded. We are reunited.” “I don’t know if I’d say we did well,” Karilyn muttered. “Crono looks a mess. Who knows what they did to him?” Vik glanced up at Silverius when she said this, and found that the mercenary indeed looked rather gaunt. His eyes had much deeper, prominent bags beneath them than before, and his hair was long enough to touch his shoulders and cast a permanent shadow over his face. “Besides,” Karilyn added after some time, “we didn’t even find Luther. I can’t believe we left him behind like that…!” Vik did not know who this ‘Luther’ person was, but he frowned in hearing the defeat in Karilyn’s voice. “I don’t think there was anyone else there. We did all we could… and now we have to work towards our real goal.” “We worked just as planned,” the Knight agreed. “Now, the world will not be able to resist our cleansing hands. The Society will soon crumble.” She turned to Silverius, her lips parting sensually, and her hand started to run circles over his exposed chest. Karilyn looked away. Silverius moved for the first time, lifting his head and turning it right towards the Chosen Knight with the same dead, emotionless glaze over his face. “I’ll kill you,” he said simply. His hand swiftly flew right to the Chosen Knight’s throat and tightened over her ivory skin. The Knight and Karilyn both gasped without air in their lungs, and Vik pounced forward, alarmed. “Silverius, stop! She saved your life! What are you doing?!” “I’ll kill her first, then all of you.” “Silverius, you idiot! She’s not your enemy!” Vik ran up to the mercenary and grabbed onto the hand he used to choke the Knight. Raised brown scars decorated his entire thin forearm. “Let her go!” “Everyone is my enemy,” Silverius growled as he turned to look at Vik. His stone-cold golden eyes were fierce enough to shock Vik into a flinch, and though the Nneonian held both hands tightly around Silverius’ arm, his grip did not budge. “You stole my death from me. I have no other purpose but to kill.” The Chosen Knight gasped as she struggled to breathe, and she raised a hand to caress Silverius’ angular face. The mercenary’s eyes widened as her slim, gentle fingers coddled his hard face, and slowly he turned to return his gaze to the Knight’s. “She’s changed,” Vik pleaded. “She’s not the same Knight she used to be. None of us are your enemy. We wanted to save your life!” “What if I don’t want to live?!” Silverius let go of the Knight’s throat and turned, holding his hands over his face as the woman he once stood poised to kill dropped to her knees. “God damn it, Silverius! Maria came back to you! We’re all here for you! Stop this angsty bullshit!” Vik exclaimed, his hands curling into frustrated fists. “He’s right, Crono,” Karilyn whispered. She majestically shed her robe and gingerly walked toward Silverius, her hands diving into the pockets of the thigh-length black fur coat she had been wearing beneath the colors of Ouroboros. “You’re not lost anymore. We found you, and now we can all work together.” “I told you not to call me that!” Silverius stood, his eyes still furiously burning with the light of the Tyrant Eyes, and dried tears of blood trickled down his cheeks. “You don’t know what they did to me. They took him from me. They took me from me, and they took Maria, and my skin, and… and…” He held his hands over his face and began to violently tremble as he faltered, leaning onto the wire-decorated walls of the airship for support. “They killed him in front of me. Me in front of me. They pulled out his intestines, and they stabbed him, and they stabbed him, and they… and they…” Vik and Karilyn stood statue-still, their eyes wide and their countenances disturbed. “Oh, Crono…” moaned Karilyn, stepping forward slowly with her hands held together over her chest. “They… they tortured you?” “Leave him,” the Chosen Knight said as she stood again, one of her hands idly pawing at her throat. “He needs time, and space.” She walked over to Silverius and grabbed onto one of his arms, pulling him off the wall and onto his feet. “Crono will return to us, in time,” she said confidently as she walked him towards the only bedroom in the airship. Silverius said nothing, at least until he had one foot in the doorway to the bedroom. “The Crono you knew is dead.” ***** Once again, Vik awoke with a headache. He had fallen asleep not long after the Chosen Knight led Silverius away; all of them had. There was nothing else for them to do on the long trip through the skies, and nowhere to go, so Vik and all of his companions had laid out in the small common room and fallen asleep quickly. He felt groggy and heavy; he had not slept enough. ‘Something woke me up…’ Vik realized. A noise – he remembered a banging or a clashing of metal. That had ripped him from his peaceful sleep, and the more he thought of it, the more the occurrence filled him with dread. He sat up and looked around the dark chamber, letting his heavy Ouroboros cloak fall to his waist. ‘I’ll never get used to wearing that,’ he thought to himself in passing. The common chamber of the airship was round in shape with the diameter of only a few feet, holding just barely enough space for him, Karilyn, and the Chosen Knight to sleep laid out on the floor. None of them had awoken or even budged, and the only two doors opposite each other broke up the quiet and dark monotony of the room. The airship was still flying stably, so he soon ruled out that the irritating crash had come from the cockpit room. Vik sighed and rubbed the crusts of sleep from his eyes as he realized the only other place the sound could have come from. ‘Not now, Silverius, please… Not here.’ Vik yawned as he walked towards the only bedroom on the small private airship, his head only increasing its pounding once he did so. ‘Whatever power I used down there was… something else.’ Never had the effects of his Tyrant abilities left his body aching this much, and for so long after he used them… though perhaps that had something to do with the fact that he had lost all memory of the event, short though it was. Vik opened the door to the bedroom, and a strong gust of wind greeted him. It took all that he had not to scream an expletive as he took in the room with its outer wall bulging out into the skies. ‘This was the noise I heard? Silverius destroying his chamber?’ He stepped into the room, panic quickly washing away his exhaustion. “Where the hell did you go?!” Holding onto the side of the chamber so as to not be blown out of the airship himself, Vik glanced out of the airship onto the land below. The airship was flying low and to the north-west. Cidolas had told the group that they would be going to Vainia’s castle in Shorekeep, so as to reunite with her and gather all the strength they could to take on Ouroboros – with a Serpent Knight, both Crystal guardians, and all three Chosen Heroes in one place, their power would be at its peak. The flight would take hours, Cidolas had also said, since they had to fly low and slow in order to evade detection from Inusians searching for them, and Vainia-employed Shoricans who would likely be violent to an Inusian airship. By now they were very close to Shorican country, though where exactly they were, Vik could not say. Directly beneath the ship was ocean, sparkling in the light of midday, and not very far off were beautiful brown beaches rolling into white snow-covered hills. The air blowing into the chamber was cold and smelled of winter, and off near the beach Vik could see a dark figure that was surrounded by tangible darkness. “Are you kidding me?” Vik exclaimed audibly, his free hand reaching up to his mild tangle of curly black hair. His head and his scar throbbed, and Vik found himself swearing in frustration. Silverius had fled, and would have gotten away without anyone noticing had Vik not woken up. ‘But I did wake up,’ he thought to himself as he started to edge towards the rough hole in the airship’s metal hull. ‘There’s no time to alert the others; Silverius is moving too fast. I’ll just have to bring him back and meet the others at Shorekeep.’ He glanced back to the door that he had closed behind him leading to the common room, where the Chosen Knight and Karilyn slept peacefully still. “Sorry, guys,” he whispered. “Wish me luck.” With an exasperated shake of his head and deep breath, Vik leapt from the hole Silverius had erected, and started to fly down to the beach below. The airship was not very high in the air, but with the speed he was flung out into the atmosphere, Vik immediately knew his fall would hurt. Fear and deadly anticipation took hold in Vik’s chest almost instantly, and his breath was ripped from his lungs not even a second into his descent. Now that he was out in the air, Vik could see the world around him, and saw that the night was close to falling. Off in the horizon, still some ways away, the sun was beginning to set and the sky was beginning to change colors. Beneath him, the ocean still sparkled, and the snow still radiated bright light. Silverius and his tornado of dark winds were moving fast, but at the speed he was falling, Vik was confident that he would meet the ex-mercenary before he dived into the dense forest of leaf-less trees that lay in waiting a mile or two behind the beach. ‘If I survive, that is…’ He had jumped forward, so he propelled to the ground at an angle, but Vik still could not tell if he would hit the ocean or the sands first. ‘Which would be worse? Either way, I don’t think my body will be intact.’ The longer Vik spent in the air, arms spread eagle and legs pointed straight behind him, the more he regretted his decision. Vik glanced quickly up at Silverius as the ground rapidly advanced to meet his body. He was still surrounded by the dark winds, though they were slowly subsiding around him. ‘His powers…’ Of course, Silverius looked like he was one step behind running below, which meant that his body had not been horribly impaired by his descent. ‘Did he use his Tyrant powers to stop himself?’ It made sense – perhaps he had used the winds to slow down his fall, or even to create a cushion beneath himself. The Nneonian started thinking faster and faster as his landing approached ever closer. ‘I can do the same… or at least, I can try.’ When Silverius used his powers, it all looked so effortless, whereas Vik had to struggle not to lose control when he let the unholy flames burn for too long. Not to mention, it would likely be easier to manipulate a fall with wind than it would be with fire. ‘I don’t have a choice,’ he thought to himself as the ground inched closer and closer with each passing millisecond. ‘This is my fire. It will burn what I tell it to!’ With another mighty pulse of his head, Vik summoned his Eyes of the Tyrant, and with them his flames. The spot he was staring at on the beach instantly combusted into black fire, though they seemed to burn stagnantly and not move very far from where they were. Next he looked down at himself, his breath further hitching from his chest as he forced the flames to manifest over his body. Just like before, at Icarun, the fire did not hurt him or his clothes. The warmth from them was calming, like the embrace of his father when he was but a child, and with fire spreading all around him he soon stopped feeling even the onslaught of the winds. He forced himself to right his position in the air and immediately afterwards landed feet first, right in the cradle of fire he created between the sands and the sea. The black fire reacted in a manner that was more solid than the splashing water and more organic than the cold, hard sand. Tendrils of darkness reached up to lick the skies as Vik landed in the pit of flames, and an odd sensation not unlike both pain and comfort overtook him. One thing he knew, though – he was not dead, and his body was not broken. Exhaustion and a wave of crippling pain swept through his mind, though, and Vik forced himself to let the flames die. Beneath him was a hollow pit of dirt that the ocean quickly started to fill in, wetting his boots with saltwater. Gingerly, Vik stepped out of the pit and onto the beach, in awe of the fact that he had survived, and with his breath still struggling to return to him. The soldier checked behind him, tightening the abundantly violet scarf around his neck as he did so. Though his fall had only lasted a few seconds, the airship that he fled was already distant in the horizon. Vik couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of isolation and loneliness as he watched the small ship fly west. He shook that feeling into the back of his mind with a groan as he turned again, searching the horizon for Silverius, the reason behind his exodus. The mercenary had stopped in his tracks, his body tall and thin in the horizon like a scarecrow standing with a bent back, and he stared right at Vik. The winds had faded, but even at this distance Vik could see the luminescent light beading out from Silverius’ eyes. Behind him, the sky slowly began to inch towards darkness. ‘He must have sensed my power or something,’ Vik thought to himself with a gulp. Though he was still somewhat breathless, Vik puffed his chest up and started to walk up the beach towards Silverius. The ex-prisoner did not retreat, but he did not advance, either. Vik brought back the Eyes of the Tyrant back to his vision, albeit this time without the manifestation of the black flames. ‘Why do I feel like Silverius isn’t the only thing on the horizon?’ The Chosen Hero of Flames knew that he and Silverius were likely going to clash. Silverius, the Chosen Hero of Wind, stood where he was and watched Vik walk up to him. Both men were silent and both men wore frowns. The sun began to set behind Silverius, and the winds began to pick up flakes of snow from the far-off trees, but the elements no longer affected the two looking each other down with golden eyes. So bright were their frowning gazes, so fierce their countenances, they stood as if two towers guarding a valley, the hard craftsmanship of each of their stones preventing any potential traveler from passing between them out of fear. Vik stopped walking when he was around ten paces away from his former comrade. He was taller and beefier than the ex-prisoner, and unlike Silverius, he stood with his back straight and his chest proudly extended in front of him. “You’re making a mistake,” Vik said with a snarl. “I’ve been told that before,” Silverius retorted, his face serious but lacking in outward strong emotion. The eyes he wore when he killed – the look of a butcher with decades of experience with slaughter under his belt – were his default visage now. “My continued existence is an error, after all. An error I won’t take back.” “I wish you’d stop with all this crazy bullshit,” Vik said with disgust. “We risked our lives to save you. All of us. It’s not right for you to just abandon us like this.” “Like I wasn’t abandoned? Like you all didn’t leave me to die, time and time again?” Despite himself, Silverius sneered. “Face it, Hero. We’re all just misfits chosen to be further alienated. I will destroy this world that has treated me so.” “That’s been your problem this whole time!” Vik yelled. His fists curled tightly, and his lip began to tremble with frenetic energy. “That whole time you were in prison, I was imprisoned, myself. By myself. But I couldn’t stop thinking about how I had to go save you and all of those I knew in Vainia’s army. You’re all my friends. None of us are alone anymore.” “No… I was born alone, and I’ll die alone. To attempt anything else… will only end in failure, for me. Failure and disaster.” “I’ve saved your life countless times, Silverius! Damn you!” The Nneonian took a moment to exhale audibly, like a frustrated bull racing after its elusive prey, and in front of him his breath misted and evaporated like steam. “We fought together in Straits City. We walked through the Mirage Desert together. I saved your life in the siege of Shorekeep. You saved my life in Empiria. Me and everyone else saved you just now! How could you say we aren’t friends? How could you say you’re alone?” By the end of his appeal, Vik was pleading to the Hero of Wind, his fists melting into hands grasping for peace. Silverius’ expression did not change. He lowered his head, and his shoulders fell, but his eyes never gained any life within them. “The Crono you saved is dead. I am his shadow, killed and resurrected countless times. I have lost everything…” “What have you lost, huh?” Vik cried out. “Your father? I lost mine, too. The last thing he said to me was that he was disappointed in me, and when I left to save your life, I signed his death certificate. Him, and my little sister. I killed them both. The last thing she said to me was that she loved me, and I promised her I would come back for her…” Vik paused, sobbing, and held a fight to his tightly clenched eyes. “I’ve broken so many promises. I’ve lost everyone. You have us still. You have the woman you love, and another one who wishes only to have your love in return. You have friends. You have power. Damn you, Silverius! I’ve always envied you!!” This was enough to give the Hero of Wind pause. “What…? How could you envy a wretch like me?” “You’ve had it all! Power, a strong lover, the will to get things done! You make your own justice… you fight your own battles… I wished for that, all of it! I kept chasing you, and thinking of ways to surpass you… And now that I’ve caught up to you, I won’t let you run away again!” With tears streaking down his cheeks like rivers cutting through ancient mountains, Vik glared up at Silverius with eyes golden. “I absolutely won’t let you fall from righteousness again.” Silverius looked up, and his frown deepened. His eyes narrowed, but continued to glow just as brightly as his comrade’s. Slowly, he reached into his loose pocket, pulling out a fist-sized sapphire Crystal and holding it in his open palm. Deep brown scars curled up his thin right arm, and he looked over the Crystal tentatively. “Your eyes still can’t see the truth,” he muttered after a moment of introspection. He glanced up to Vik, and his ruthless visage remained ever adamant. “I have never been anything but ruined. You can chase after a shadow, but you can never reach it. You can try to rule a corrupt world, but you can never save it.” A dark wind began to blow about the two Heroes, and flakes of snow began to float, gathered and agitated by the flurry. “So that’s it, huh? You think I’m just going to let you run away again without putting up a fight?” Vik sniffed and wiped his nose, his sorrowful face growing taunt and determined. “On the contrary,” Silverius said with a deadpan and empty expression. “I want to test my ability against one with power. Give me all that you can.” The Hero of Flame crossed his fists over his eyes, summoning all of his Tyrant powers – and setting his hands ablaze. As he lowered them, his unburning hands drifting trails of obsidian fire behind them, he took a deep breath and lowered his body weight. “As you wish.” Vik felt his eyes tingle and his body immediately fill with adrenaline – with life – as he pounced forward, his blazing fists rushing for Silverius’ chest. The Hero of Wind had summoned the winds even faster than Vik could move, and with a wide swipe of his hand, the prisoner pushed Vik to the side with a gust of wind. Vik caught his footing as he cemented his feet on the slippery snow, using his momentum to rush forward with another punch intended for Silverius’ torso. This time Silverius was still in the retreating motion that had swept Vik away and would be unable to summon winds to push him away – so he pulled them back, grabbing onto the white snow-carrying winds as if they were palpable. Vik slammed his fist into an almost tangible shield of wind and snow, strong enough to keep his flames from bursting through to Silverius’ flesh but effective enough to knock the prisoner backwards. Vik took this chance and ran with it. He cocked his fists back again and dashed right towards Silverius with the intent of tackling him and then pummeling him with his hands to tear up his flesh. ‘I won’t kill you, but I won’t let you run away, either!’ the Nneonian thought to himself. As he was faltering backwards, Silverius looked up to Vik fiercely with a gaze strong enough to make the Nneonian flinch. There, in that single instant, Silverius jerked his flailing arms towards the ground – and he flew. A massive, sudden gust sent Vik almost flying backwards himself as snow cascaded over him, like the ground had exploded. When he regained his footing, he looked up and saw Silverius a good distance away, hands out to his sides and a small tornado of wind circulating around him, snow visibly snaking through the breeze. The man’s black hair undulated about him organically, and he looked Vik right in his eyes just as darkly as ever. The Nneonian coughed and felt his hands tingling. The flames had started to fade, as if extinguished by the snow falling all around him, and he felt the life drain from him just as quickly as it had coursed through his veins. “Damn,” he muttered, bringing his fists to his glowing eyes again. “I’ve been using these too often all of a sudden. I’m not used to controlling them like this yet…” As if in response, once Vik rekindled the black fire gloving his fists, Silverius raised his right hand into the air and the winds started to curl around it. Vik could hardly believe his eyes, as the white-tinged wind wrapped and hardened around Silverius’ open hand, like a blade of constantly moving ivory steel. Once the magical weapon was formed, Silverius lowered his arm, and though the tornado of winds had morphed into his blade, its gusts were still enough to gently toss his unkempt black hair around. From there Silverius went on the offensive, and he moved even faster than the winds he commanded. His initial strike missed Vik’s face by inches, and the winds sung in the Nneonian’s ears as he stepped back from the slash. The mystical sword in front of him was purely white, and as it flashed past Vik’s nose, he knew that a single hit from it would cut him in two. Vik could barely keep up with Silverius’ incredibly quick movements, even with the exponential boost to his reflexes and vision that the Tyrant Eyes gifted him. The ex-prisoner threw himself into his slashes as if he were a rag doll, throwing around his arm and using the winds behind him to further explode into his attacks. Vik kept up by the skin of his teeth, and multiple attacks he only survived because of his flame-covered hands parrying the sword of white winds. Again, and again, and again, an attack slammed into his hands, from every direction, without pause. Even though he was swathed in invincible fire, he felt his hands begin to bleed and crack beneath the pressure of Silverius’ hardened sword of tempests. Finally Vik pushed away Silverius’ sword with both hands and jumped back himself, using the momentum to roll in the snow and gain some distance from the ex-prisoner. As he did so, he grabbed onto the ground beneath him for friction in order to slow his movements, and as he did so the flames faded once more from his hands. With heavy pants, black smoke rising from his hands, and his eyes squinted with pain, Vik looked over the Hero of Wind with fear. ‘I can’t cross this gap,’ he thought to himself reluctantly. ‘His experience with his ability completely outclasses mine. The only way I could win is if I covered myself in fire again, but I’d lose control… I’d kill him.’ Sweat trickled down Vik’s brow, running through his long scar like a river down an ancient canyon. “You’re using those flames to subdue me,” Silverius said calmly as he lowered his ivory sword, his neutral stance open and full of holes. With the winds behind him, there was no need to physically defend himself. “I’m not limiting myself. That’s why you won’t defeat me.” “Shut up,” Vik wheezed. “I’m not done yet.” “You are.” Silverius raised his right hand straight into the air, and the strength of the winds in the area magnified. Just as he pulled forth a longsword-length blade out of the tempests, now he started to construct a massive sword, reaching into the sky with almost the length of his entire body. Even at this distance, if he swung such a blade, Vik knew he would be torn asunder. “No,” Vik said. “I’m not letting you kill me. I’m not letting you go anywhere!” He raised his hands to his eyes, and in response Silverius took a single step forward, in order to lower his hand and his sword – but Vik did not encase his fists in flames. Instead he ripped his hands away with intense focus, forcing his gaze of tyranny to land on the small part of Silverius’ raised arm that was exposed. Instantly it exploded with black flames, concentrated to his shoulder and upper bicep. The fire was enough to cause Silverius’ arm to fall and his concentration to fade. Instantly the winds faded away and the ex-prisoner took a knee, his arm hanging limply and now-unsuspended snow falling down all around him. As soon as he fell, his head soundlessly lowering and his free arm tightly clawing onto the skin of his burning appendage, Vik stood up with a grunt and forced power into his eyes again, cutting away the fire from existence just as quickly as he had summoned it. “I shouldn’t have had to do that,” Vik panted, his boots slowly crunching in the discarded snow as he inched towards Silverius’ unmoving body. “You should have listened to me!” As the black smoke rose from the ex-prisoner’s shoulder, Vik could see that he had allowed the flames to burn just long enough to rip apart Silverius’ flesh. Molten olive skin melted down over his fingers, and charred bone peeked out beneath bubbling muscle and emerging blood. Vik stopped a few steps away from his fallen comrade when he heard the winds whistling about him again, slowly rising in frequency and volume. Silverius raised his head, dark bangs falling over his eyes and the bridge of his nose, and looked up to Vik with empty golden eyes. “After all I’ve been through, you think something like this hurts?” The ex-prisoner waved his left hand horizontally in front of his chest, summoning a small gust of wind to cut into Vik’s chest. Like a single note of a song, the small tempest of snow solidified and swiftly cut across Vik’s torso, wresting open his chest and sending him screaming backwards. The cut was deep, thin, and painful, and blood started to stain through his black clothes. Silverius stood, his useless arm hanging from the flesh of its barely-surviving shoulder and its blood dripping down to stain the pristine snow. He looked down at Vik, merciless, before glancing up at the ocean. The tempest was not entirely his own; Cidolas’ stolen airship was descending and making its way to the beach, and the air was undulating in response. “I won’t kill you now, but we will meet again,” Silverius said as he turned towards the forest to the north. “You can’t leave!” Vik exclaimed. He had dragged himself to his knees, but he could not stand due to the headache pulsing through his head and the wide cut stretching across his wide pectorals. “We have to save this world! That’s what we were chosen for!” “…This world means nothing to me.” Without mincing his words any longer, Silverius walked off into the forest, his back as bent as ever but not from defeat. He left towards the north and turned eastward, back towards Inusia. When the airship got close enough to the beach that it started to blow around the snow, Silverius summoned a handful of wind and pushed himself into the air, just high enough to arc downwards into the woods and disappear. Vik tried to stand up and chase after him, but he only fell on his back with a hand reaching towards the elusive forest of dead, leafless stalks. The winds continued to dance and sing around him, and as the Chosen Hero of Wind raised his head to squint at the darkened sky, he saw that the airship was lowering over him, not going towards the forest. “No! No, stop,” he screamed. “You’re going after the wrong one! Go after him! Go after Silverius!” He screamed and screamed until he was out of breath, but he could not even hear himself behind the exhaust and whirlwind of the airship’s landing. ...End of Part Forty-Six. <- Previous Page | Main Page | Next Page ->